Bookkeeper Convicted Of Forging Paychecks From Boss

Prosecutors said Amy Bessey enlisted her ex-convict brother and her son to kill her estranged husband for $250,000 in insurance money. (Getty Images)

LAS VEGAS (AP) — A part-time Las Vegas bookkeeper convicted of forging paychecks to embezzle more than half a million dollars from her former employer has been sentenced and ordered to pay back the money.

The Nevada Attorney General’s Office says 47-year-old Maria Digna Ballasteros has been sentenced to two back-to-back terms of one to four years in the Nevada Department of Corrections.

Investigators say Ballasteros had been working for a Las Vegas-based promotion company since 2007 when her employer reported she was forging payroll checks after they had been distributed by the company.

Detectives say she forged and cashed more than 225 fraudulent checks and then falsified bank records to make it look like the theft never happened.